increased respect and esteem. He had been promoted to a captaincy,
and such was the response of the loyal North, during that dreary
summer of disaster and confused counsels, that his company was nearly
full, and he was daily expecting orders for departure. His drill
ground had become the occasional morning resort of his friends, and
each day gave evidence of improved soldierly bearing in his men.

Merwyn thus far had characteristically carried out his plans to
"kill time." Thoroughly convinced of his comparative superiority,
he had been good-naturedly tolerant of the slow recognition accorded
to it by Marian. Yet he believed he was making progress, and the
fact that her favor was hard to win was only the more incitement.
If she had shown early and decided preference his occupation would
have been gone; for what could he have done in those initiatory
weeks of their acquaintance if her eyes and tones had said, "I am
ready to take you and your wealth"? The attitude she maintained,
although little understood, awakened a kind of respect, while the
barriers she quietly interposed aroused a keener desire to surmount
them. By hauteur and reserve at times he had made those with whom
he associated feel that his position in regard to the civil conflict
was his own affair. Even Marian avoided the subject when talking
with him, and her mother never thought of mentioning it. Indeed,
that thrifty lady would have been rather too encouraging had not
her daughter taken pains to check such a spirit. At the same time
the young girl made it emphatically understood that discussion of
the events of the war should be just as free when he was present
as when he was absent.

Yet in a certain sense he was making progress, in that he awakened
anger on her part, rather than indifference. If she was a new type